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Summary: Ashline and Ellis-Monaghan Interdisciplinary Population Projects
INTERDISCIPLINARY POPULATION PROJECTS IN A FIRST
SEMESTER CALCULUS COURSE
George Ashline and Joanna Ellis-Monaghan
ADDRESS: Department of Mathematics
St. Michael's College
Winooski Park
Colchester, VT 05439
E-mail:
gashline@smcvt.edu
jellis-monaghan@smcvt.edu
ABSTRACT: We discuss how applications from microbiology and sociology can be
used to involve students and give a physical context for critical concepts in a first
semester calculus course. Using data they collect themselves (from bacteria or
yeast grown in a laboratory, for example), students develop elementary models of
population growth in interdisciplinary class projects. Using the tools of calculus,
demographic software, and available technology (CAS or graphing calculator),
students then proceed from 'microcosm to macrocosm', moving from biology to
sociology, to address questions of human population projections.
KEYWORDS: Calculus, interdisciplinary projects, biological modeling, demographic
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